Shirley tours toxic site
Soil being replaced

Harry Allen, the on-site coordinator for the Environmental Protection Agency, shows Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley Jr. how a device can measure radiation in the soil at the Red Water Pond Road community. [Photo by Brian Leddy/Independent]

By Natasha Kaye Johnson
Diné Bureau

Four-year-old Drew Nez plays in the dirt in the Red Water Pond Road community during a media event on Friday. Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley visited the area to view the cleanup efforts and talk to residents at the site where soil contamination occurred from nearby uranium mines operated by the Uranium Nuclear Corporation. [Photo by Brian Leddy/Independent]

CHURCH ROCK — Twenty-seven years ago, the dam in Church Rock burst, spilling more than 1,100 tons of radioactive mill waste and 90 million gallons of contaminated liquid into the ground.

It was the worst uranium accident in U.S. history.

The Nez, Nakai, and Hoods are just a few of the families whose homes rest between two rolling mountains of dirt contaminated with uranium, not far from where the spill occurred.

More than 50 families live in the Red Water Pond area and on Pipeline Canyon Road, with 20 of the families living only a half-mile from the abandoned United Nuclear Corporation Church Rock Mine, where piles of radioactive dirt remain. Thirty other families live just 1.5 miles from the abandoned Kerr-McGee Church Rock Mine and the UNC Uranium Mill Tailings Facility.

Many of the families have been living in the area for generations, long before uranium mining began in the late 1960's. No one, including government agencies or uranium mining companies, ever told the families about the toxic and radioactive conditions in the area.

Nearly six weeks ago, families were notified that they had to temporarily be removed from their homes after a clean-up was initiated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Navajo Nation Environmental Protection Agency. Five Navajo families were placed in local hotels in Gallup so that polluted dirt could be removed from around, and even inside their homes. Some homes' entire floors, including concrete, had to be completely removed. In some cases, the home was found to have been built with dirt used from the mines.

Phase I of the project started in the first week of April. The anticipated cost of the first phase is about $2.1 million, which will go towards removing over 5,000 cubic feet of contaminated dirt that surrounds the homes.

By next week, Harry Allen, on-scene coordinator, U.S. EPA Region 9 San Francisco office, said that new dirt will be brought in from Gallup to replace the removed dirt. The polluted dirt will be temporarily placed at the mine and will be stored in plastic until it can be transported to a radioactive landfill in Utah.

Public Meeting
Friday afternoon, nearly 30 local residents attended a public meeting about Phase I, hoping to hear from leaders and officials in attendance that the placed they called home would soon be restored to livable conditions. They were hoping to hear that soon, it would be okay for their children to play in the arroyos and rolling hills and that they could all breathe in the air without fear it could lead to something terrible.

They did not hear any such promises or get any assurance that things would be restored back to balance immediately, but were told that it was diligently being worked and asked to have continued patience.

There were mixed feelings about the project. Some were glad about the clean-up, while others said it should have never been initiated. Others expressed that they wanted quicker results, and brought up other concerns.

"Our main concern is long-term protection," said Teddy Nez, resident and spokesperson for the community on uranium issues.

Nez said he would like to see entities like the Indian Health Service and the Navajo Nation Division of Health working together to conduct a comprehensive health study in the area. No health studies have ever been conducted in the area, despite its long history of uranium mining and its high rate of various cancers.

Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley, Jr. attended the meeting and heard the plights of concerned citizens.

Monitoring
In 2003, radiation monitoring done by the Church Rock Uranium Monitoring Project and the Navajo Nation Environmental Protection Agency, among a number of state and federal agencies, proved what the people had feared for years. There was radiation, and it was made clear it was beyond dangerous.

In 2003 data was collected and given to United Nuclear Corporation that proved that radiation levels around waste piles of the homes were more than 20 times higher than normal. But they disregarded the numbers.

"The company said 'we don't know of any off site contamination'," said Chris Shuey, with the Southwest Research and Information Center, based out of Albuquerque. "They were acting like we were all stupid. It took a threat of a legal action."

Conaminated
Allen collected soil samples last fall and winter, and as did other entities from previous years, who determined once again that the area was highly contaminated.

"All of this confirms what we found three years ago," said Shuey.

"It's not been safe to live in these areas for a long time," said Allen.

Dan Mere, chief of Response, Planning, and Assessment Branch, Superfund Division with the U.S. EPA Region 9 San Francisco office, explained to community members in attendance the priorities of the EPA when cleaning sites includes three principles. The first, he said, is to protect human health, which means removing families if necessary. The second is to make every effort to enforcement the entities responsible.

"We try and find who's responsible and compel them to take responsibility for what they've done," he said. "People and agencies responsible for contamination should be responsible for clean-up."

The third principle, he said, is to address the worst contamination first.

"We know that's there's been a long history of this mining and has had a devastating impact," said Mere. "On behalf of the Environmental Protection Agency, we're sorry for that impact and we want do everything we can to address it."